Teaching Tips: Ex-slave Frederick Douglass Joins the Abolitionists

Here are suggested ways to engage students with this video and with activities related to this topic.

Viewing the video: Use the following suggestions to guide students’ viewing of the video.

• Before: Ask students what dangers Frederick Douglass might face as a fugitive slave. Why could someone like Douglass be a convincing spokesperson for the abolitionist movement?
• After: Why was it important for white and black abolitionists to work together?

Research project—individual: Ask students to read portions of a speech that Douglass delivered on July 4, 1852, and discuss the points he made and the way in which he engaged his audience. Students can also read excerpts from Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Ask students to research Douglass’s two later biographies and discuss how they differ in emphasis. The relationship between Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, and Douglass’s career after the Civil War, are also topics for additional research. Students can also investigate the role of other freed slaves and prominent black abolitionists, including Lewis Hayden, Harriet Jacobs, John Parker, Maria Stewart, and William Still.

Class activity—group or individual: Have students explore The Abolitionist Map of America, an interactive map that features archival images, documents, and videos. You may want to have students explore the map with a particular focus, such as by years or regions. Each student or group of students can have a different focus and then share their findings with the class. As a further research project, students might investigate abolitionist history in your region; as a class, you could contribute your findings to the map project.

Research project—group or individual: Many of the men and women who participated in the abolitionist movement are not well known today. Have students research one of the abolitionists on the African American Abolitionists Research List (PDF) to find out who this person was, why this person felt the way he or she did, and how this person acted as a result. You can let students select the person who interests them the most or assign names for individual students or groups to research. To direct their research, you can provide students with a particular focus or a list of questions to answer. Here are some examples:

• Make the case that this person should be the subject of a film or documentary, like the video clip that you watched. Present your research to the class to explain your subject's importance and why he or she is someone who merits learning about in greater depth.
• How did African Americans stand up against slavery? In what ways was their participation in the abolitionist movement different from that of their white contemporaries?

Before students start their research, stipulate the types of sources that they need to use. For example, you can instruct them to have an online biographical source as well as a primary source connected to the person. Or suggest that they use websites related to historical or academic organizations so that they are not relying on Wikipedia. The African American Abolitionists Research List (PDF) includes website links to get them started.

After researching a particular abolitionist, students need to share what they have discovered. Keep in mind that the amount of material available for particular abolitionists varies, so this will impact what students will be able to prepare for their assignments.

An example of a challenging writing assignment might be a speech of two to three minutes, since meetings and public speaking were the medium through which much of the abolitionist message was spread. You could have students write short speeches from the point of view of their chosen abolitionist. The speech could also focus on one of the following ideas:

• Share what was learned about the person’s enslavement.
• In the role of the abolitionist, take a stand against slavery.
• Imagine what an enslaved person might do with his or her freedom.